After over 17 years in the high school football space as a coach and over 12 years helping athletes with NUC Sports, I have come to a very sad conclusion. Parents and athletes have no clue what they are doing in the recruiting process, have no idea where to get the information needed, have no understanding of the NCAA rules, and further have no inclination to give the effort necessary to get themselves in a better situation. Parents and athletes have been waiting for a handout from their coaches, from college coaches and from associates surrounding college sports. They all think that magically things will just happen. My answer is please please first learn the rules of recruiting and the NCAA. This is the first step. I love working with athletes but have grown increasingly tired of the same exact questions, with no knowledge of anything to do with recruiting. Here are some of the questions I get.

#1 Will there be scouts at my son’s event? No there will not be scouts because outside of April 15- May 30th and specifically only for Juniors, D1 coaches cannot watch your athlete participate in an event under the NCAA rules. They cannot see a combine period and cannot watch you participate unless they are watching a scholastic based event. For example, they can come to your track meet in the spring. They can watch you work out which counts as a athletic evaluation. They are allowed 1 in the spring and 1 academic evaluation. At college camps on their campus obviously they can evaluate you. Treat showcase events as information and video based evaluation tools that act as 1. publicity 2. Information from evaluators from the event that get shared with college coaches and 3. An opportunity to compete against top athletes. Now with the internet and video at NUC sports we send direct links and information to all the college coaches that serves as a filtering in and filtering out process of top athletes. At the D3 level coaches can go and evaluate whenever they want, and on campus or off, but the financial resources of D3 programs limit their travel.

#2 How do i get in contact with college coaches? This is beyond mind boggling to me, but here is the answer! Call them, Email them, go to campus, and DM them on Instagram and Twitter. Reaching out with your information, video and transcript is critical. Make a video and send it, introduce them to you! Do something that makes you stand out but by all means you must reach out to them. The NCAA rules prohibit college coaches from reaching out to underclassmen other than Juniors in the spring on a limited basis. So you must get your name out there. Events are great for publicity and evaluation and reach out directly to the coaches is necessary! The Recruiting Calendar can be found here http://www.ncaa.org/student-athletes/resources/recruiting-calendars

#3 Why isn’t my son being recruited? Well see answer #2 if you haven’t reached out. If you have an he is still isn’t then choose new schools to reach out to. It is ridiculous to reach out to the same schools over and over again and they have no interest. Reach out to new schools. If those schools show no interest then reach out to a lower level. Know your son’s athleticism, speed and size are direct factors in recruiting. Stop fooling yourself to think you are going to get a D1 scholarship when you are 5’6 and run a 4.8 40…it ain’t happening. I had a coach get mad at me because I told his athlete to reach out to D3 schools because his athlete was 5’9 205 and wanted to be a D1 lineman. In the history of mankind there has never been a D1 lineman at 5’9 205. Choose the right level. Finally, If you have bad grades and bad SAT/ACT scores you won’t qualify, so pick your grades up and improve your scores or you will not qualify to get recruited.

NCAA Sliding Scale, You can Google It and Find the Info

#4. How can you help me get recruited? This one particularly irks me….How can i help any athlete without knowing more about them. We need to as athletes and parents learn about what makes our athlete unique, reach out to someone like myself who can help them, in a way that will want to make me want to help them. There is no right to play in college, there is no right to get help and its not FREE. Over the dozen years i have been helping athletes with providing information to college coaches for FREE, i have never been able to provide direct 1 to 1 help unless the athlete A. Played for me or B. I knew them. There is a C. If you are a good enough athlete, good enough student, and are recruitable and are willing to pay for my time or another experts time you can get direct help. Don’t expect something for nothing. In most cases, someone like myself, just like a college coach will want to know a lot more than just your film, because in 99 percent of the cases the athletes film does not clearly standout. My advice is to learn as much as you can, figure out where your abilities are, attend events and then reach out for assistance.

#5. My coach sucks or doesn’t help me in recruiting can you help me? My short answer on this is NO. If you think your coach sucks and he doesnt help you then you are probably a headache that no college coach wants. Develop a relationship with your high school so he wants to help you. If you can’t do that in 90% of the cases playing in college may not be in the cards for you. So many parents contact me complaining about there coach that it is overwhelming and ridiculous. Support your coach and he will support you. If you jump around from school to school and think every coach sucks, then more than likely you and your family will be disgruntled parents at the college level and college coaches just aren’t willing to deal with that. They are getting rid of kids in college that run 4.4 in the 40 who are headaches so they certainly aren’t interested in a borderline athlete who runs a 4.9 in the 40. My advice is develop a relationship with your coach, work harder than anyone on the field, play better than anyone on the field, be a great teammate, be a great person and be a great student, and chances are you will have a great high school experience, your coach will be willing to help you and a college coach will be willing to recruit you.

#6.Does the school and how good they are going to help me in recruiting? The reality is how good you play and what kind of student you are helps you in the process, not what kind of team you are on. If you are great and you reach out to schools you will have a great chance on being recruited. If you are average it does not matter where you go. An excellent team can provide you with some additional exposure but it can also hurt you if you are the 5th best player on a great team. So my advice is be the very best player on the field and it won’t matter what school you play at. If you combine that with reaching out like i spoke about in point #1 you will get recruited.

I just like to point out the truths. As always you can reach me on twitter at David Schuman or on instagram at NUC_football or DaveSchuman. Send me a DM, I will respond.

About NUC Sports

NUC is the longest running underclassmen event and it’s the most respected high school combine and football camp in the country. If you’re serious about taking your game to the next level, playing college football or getting early exposure to college recruiters then attend an NUC Recruiting Event.